Due to China's large population and area, the administrative divisions of China have consisted of several levels since ancient times. The constitution of China provides for three de jure levels of government. Currently, however, there are five practical (de facto) levels of local government: the provincial (province, autonomous region, municipality, and special administrative region), prefecture, county, township, and village.

Since the 17th century, provincial boundaries in China have remained largely static. Major changes since then have been the reorganization of provinces in the northeast after the establishment of the People's Republic of China and the formation of autonomous regions, based on Soviet ethnic policies. The provinces serve an important cultural role in China, as people tend to identify with their native province.

Levels

The Constitution of China provides for four levels[citation needed]: the provincial (province, autonomous region, municipality, and special administrative region), the prefectural (prefecture-level city[officially "city with district-level divisions" (设区的市) and "city without district-level divisions" (不设区的市)], autonomous prefecture, prefecture [additional division] and league [the alternative name of “prefecture” which is used in Inner Mongolia]), county (district, county, county-level city [officially “city without district-level divisions”], autonomous county, banner [the alternative name of “county” which is used in Inner Mongolia], autonomous banner [the alternative name of “autonomous county” which is used in Inner Mongolia], special district [additional division], forestry area [additional division]) and township. It’s must be noted that, the fifth level which is commonly known as “village level” is actually not an administrative level. The Constitution of China designs the fifth level as “basic level autonomy”. As of 2017[update], China administers 33 provincial-level regions, 334 prefecture-level divisions, 2,862 county-level divisions, 41,034 township-level administrations, and 704,382 basic level autonomies.[citation needed][1]

Provinces are theoretically subservient to the PRC central government, but in practice provincial officials have large discretion with regard to economic policy. Unlike the United States, the power of the central government was (with the exception of the military) not exercised through a parallel set of institutions until the early 1990s. The actual practical power of the provinces has created what some economists call federalism with Chinese characteristics.

Most of the provinces, with the exception of the provinces in the northeast, have boundaries which were established long ago in the Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties. Sometimes provincial borders form cultural or geographical boundaries. This was an attempt by the imperial government to discourage separatism and warlordism through a divide and rule policy. Nevertheless, provinces have come to serve an important cultural role in China. People tend to be identified in terms of their native provinces, and each province has a stereotype that corresponds to their inhabitants.

Provincial-level (1st) subdivisions

22 Provinces (省; shěng): A standard provincial government is nominally led by a provincial committee, headed by a secretary. The committee secretary is first-in-charge of the province, come in second is the governor of the provincial government.

5 Autonomous regions (自治区; zìzhìqū): A minority subject which has a higher population of a particular minority ethnic group along with its own local government, but an autonomous region theoretically has more legislative rights than in actual practice. The governor of the Autonomous Regions is usually appointed from the respective minority ethnic group.

4 Municipalities (直辖市; zhíxiáshì): A higher level of city that is directly under the Chinese government, with status equal to that of the provinces. In practice, their political status is higher than that of common provinces.

2 Special administrative regions (SARs) (特别行政区;tèbié xíngzhèngqū): A highly autonomous and self-governing subnational subject of the People's Republic of China. Each SAR has a chief executive as head of the region and head of government. The SAR's government is not fully independent, as foreign policy and military defence are the responsibility of the central government, according to the Basic Laws of the two SARs.[5][6][7]

1 Claimed province: The People's Republic of China claims the island of Taiwan and its surrounding islets, including Penghu, as "Taiwan Province". (Kinmen and the Matsu Islands are claimed by the PRC as part of its Fujian Province. Pratas and Itu Aba are claimed by the PRC as part of Guangdong and Hainan provinces respectively.) The territory is controlled by the Republic of China (ROC, commonly called "Taiwan").

Click any region for more info. For a larger version of this map, see here.

Prefectural level (2nd)

Prefectural level divisions or second-level divisions are the second level of the administrative structure. Most provinces are divided into only prefecture-level cities and contain no other second level administrative units. Of the 22 provinces and 5 autonomous regions, only 3 provinces (Yunnan, Guizhou, Qinghai) and 1 autonomous region (Xinjiang) have more than three second-level or prefectural-level divisions that are not prefecture-level cities. As of 18, August 2015, there were 334 prefectural level divisions:

294 Prefecture-level cities (地级市; dìjíshì): the largest number of prefectural-level divisions, generally composed of an urban center and surrounding rural areas much larger than the urban core and thus not "cities" but municipalities in the strict sense of the term

3 Leagues (盟; méng): effectively the same as prefectures, but found only in Inner Mongolia. Like prefectures, leagues have mostly been replaced with prefecture-level cities. The unique name is a holdover from earlier forms of administration in Mongolia.

1,408 Counties (县; xiàn): the most common county-level divisions, continuously in existence since the Warring States period, much earlier than any other level of government in China. Xian is often translated as "district" or "prefecture".

360 County-level cities (县级市; xiànjíshì): similar to prefecture-level cities, covering both urban and rural areas. It was popular for counties to become county-level cities in the 1990s, though this has since been halted.

913 Districts (市辖区; shìxiáqū): formerly the subdivisions of urban areas, consisting of built-up areas only. Recently many counties have become districts, so that districts are now often just like counties, with towns, villages, and farmland.

49 Banners (旗; qí): the same as counties except in the name, a holdover from earlier forms of administration in Mongolia

3 Autonomous banners (自治旗; zìzhìqí): the same as autonomous counties except in the name, a holdover from earlier forms of administration in Mongolia

1 Forestry area (林区; línqū): a special county-level forestry district located in Hubei province

1 Special district (特区; tèqū): a special county-level division located in Guizhou province

2 District public offices (区公所; qūgōngsuǒ) are a vestigial level of government. These once represented an extra level of government between the county- and township-levels. Today there are very few of these remaining and they are gradually being phased out.

Basic level autonomy (5th)

The basic level autonomy serves as an organizational division (census, mail system) and does not have much importance in political representative power. Basic local divisions like neighborhoods and communities are not informal like in America, but have defined boundaries and elected heads (one per area):

In urban areas, every subdistrict of a district of a city administers many communities or residential committees. Each of them have a residential committee to administer the dwellers of that neighborhood or community. Rural areas are organized into village committees or villager groups. A "village" in this case can either be a natural village, one that spontaneously and naturally exists, or a virtual village, which is a bureaucratic entity.

Special cases

Five cities formally on prefectural level have a special status in regard to planning and budget. They are separately listed in the five-year and annual state plans on the same level as provinces and national ministries, making them economically independent of their provincial government. These cities specifically designated in the state plan (Chinese: 计划单列市) are

Some other large prefecture-level cities, known as sub-provincial cities, are half a level below a province. The mayors of these cities have the same rank as a vice governor of a province, and their district governments are half a rank higher than those of normal districts. The capitals of some provinces (seat of provincial government) are sub-provincial cities. In addition to the five cities specifically designated in the state plan, sub-provincial cities are[10]

Some districts are also placed at half a level higher that what it should be. Examples are Pudong, Shanghai and Binhai, Tianjin. Although its status as a district of a municipality would define it as prefecture-level, the district head of Pudong is given sub-provincial powers. In other words, it is half a level higher than what it would normally be.

Province-like, which is the municipality of Chongqing, a merger of 4 former prefectures and similar to the former Eastern-Sichuan province

Prefecture-like, which are the other three municipalities and almost all prefectural-level cities, usually 10-1,000 times larger than the urban center and a conglomeration of several counties and county-level cities. Some of them in sparsely populated areas like Hulunbuir are even larger than Chongqing but have a population comparable to that of prefectures.

County-like, which is all sub-prefecture-level and some county-level cities, and several extremely simple prefecture-level cities (Jiayuguan, Xiamen, Haikou, etc.)

Not substantially larger than urban establishment: some county-level cities, plus some members of the previous category. However, country-level cities converted from counties is unlikely to belong here. Shanghai, despite being prefecture-like in size, belongs here due to its subway already extending beyond municipality limits. Some other economically prosperous prefecture-level cities are also provoking inter-prefecture urban integration, although they still possess (and never intend to eliminate) large swaths of rural area.

When used in the statistical data, the word "city" may have three different meanings:

The area comprising its urban city districts and suburb city districts. The difference between the urban district and the suburb districts is that an urban district comprises only the subdistricts, while a suburb district also has towns and townships to govern rural areas. In some sense, this definition is approximately the metropolitan area. This definition is not applied to the sub-prefecture-level city and the county-level city since they do not have city districts under them.

Somewhat bizarrely, some districts such as Haidian District also possess towns. They have been treated clearly as urban districts for decades, but not from the inception, and indeed some areas rural but other areas form an inseparable part of the central city.

The urban area. Sometimes the urban area is referred as (Chinese: 市区; pinyin: shìqū). For the municipality, the sub-provincial city, and the prefecture-level city, it comprises the urban city district and the adjacent subdistricts of the suburb city districts. For the sub-prefecture-level city and the county-level city, only central subdistricts are included. This definition is close to the strict meaning of "city" in western countries.

It is important to specify the definition of "city" when referring to statistical data of Chinese cities, otherwise, confusion may arise. For example, Shanghai is the largest city in China by population in the urban area but is smaller than Chongqing by the population within the administration area.[11]

History

Before the establishment of the Qin Dynasty, China was ruled by a network of kings, nobles, and tribes. The rivalry of these groups culminated in the Warring States period, and the state of Qin eventually emerged dominant.

The Qin Dynasty was determined not to allow China to fall back into disunity, and therefore designed the first hierarchical administrative divisions in China, based on two levels: jùncommanderies and xiàncounties. The Han Dynasty that came immediately after added zhōu (usually translated as "provinces") as a third level on top, forming a three-tier structure.

The Sui Dynasty and Tang Dynasty abolished commanderies, and added circuits (dào, later lù under the Song and Jin) on top, maintaining a three-tier system that lasted through the 13th Century. (As a second-level division, zhou are translated as "prefectures".) The Mongol-established Yuan Dynasty introduced the modern precursors to provinces, bringing the number of levels to four. This system was then kept more or less intact until the Qing Dynasty, the last imperial dynasty to rule China.

The Republic of China streamlined the levels to just provinces and counties in 1928, and made the first attempt to extend political administration beyond the county level by establishing townships below counties. This was also the system officially adopted by the People's Republic of China in 1949, which defined the administrative divisions of China as three levels: provinces, counties, and townships.

In practice, however, more levels were inserted. The ROC government soon learned that it was not feasible for a province to directly govern tens and sometimes hundreds of counties. Started from Jiangxi province in 1935, Prefectures were later inserted between provinces and counties. They continue be ubiquitously applied by the PRC government to nearly all areas of China until the 1980s. Since then, most of the prefectures were converted into prefecture-level cities. Greater administrative areas were inserted on top of provinces by the PRC government, but they were soon abolished, in 1954. District public offices were inserted between counties and townships; once ubiquitous as well, they are currently being abolished, and very few remain.

Reform

In recent years there have been calls to reform the administrative divisions and levels of China. Rumours of an impending major reform have also spread through various online bulletin boards.[12]

The district public offices is an ongoing reform to remove an extra level of administration from between the county and township levels. There have also been calls to abolish the prefecture level, and some provinces have transferred some of the power prefectures currently hold to the counties they govern. There are also calls to reduce the size of the provinces. The ultimate goal is to reduce the different administration levels from five to three (Provincial level, County level, Village level), reducing the amount of corruption as well as the number of government workers, in order to lower the budget.

^Archived copy中华人民共和国行政区划 [Administrative divisions of the People's Republic of China], 15 June 2005, archived from the original on 2010-07-23, retrieved 5 June 2010CS1 maint: Archived copy as title (link)